Faith in the Serpent
by Liz S. Wool
Summary: After the events of Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince, Snape stumbles toward the Island of Black Sand. He enters his own world of personal betrayal and discovers the depth of his own investment into His Lord as well as those he is loyal to.


The Bloody Mary Chronicles

Part One: Faith in the Serpent

Chapter One

Of Sand and Thestrals

Finally the mark had flamed to life, flicking once again into existence and marring the man's pale flesh once more. The blank, hollow eyes of the skull were boring a glare through his mind; it was so ugly and dangerous, so dark and menacing.

Thin, spindly pale fingers touched the mark, and felt its burn, and with a hiss of pain he let greasy black hair hood dark, dull eyes.

Severus Snape's skin was even whiter, hair even lankier, he had been sick with that aching pain of death in his soul. Ever since The Mark had begun to return, ominous and revolting, he had been stricken with inability to eat, and an even greater strain at his heart.

Even as he traversed the Dark Forest, every frail muscle in his body was straining to return to the heat and warmth of the castle, to safety, and to the comfort and warmth of whisky and eventual unconsciousness.

But it was Severus's heart, so worn and cold, that pulled him toward the edge of the grounds, and the pulsing in the mark on his arm that drove his tired body onward.

Consequences and any other terms of his decision had been diluted and abandoned in his quarters in Hogwarts castle, maybe he wanted to torture himself, or maybe his mind had run off to find his sanity.

As he reached the edge of the forest, he could feel the wards of apparition open their gaping jaws in his direction, and gladly, Severus took the opportunity. He closed tired eyes and let the vacuum of apparition envelope his body, and as he landed, a chill swept over his skin.

The island always made him claustrophobic, thestrals circling high over head searching for meat on blood soaked black beaches. The dark waves crashed on the shore violently, exacerbated by the torrent of rain and wind that tossed tree branches around like rag-dolls. Any life that had inhabited the Island had been snuffed out by the vile force that lived up on the hill.

Severus could see the silhouette of the castle – so frighteningly familiar with its broken windows and faint red lighting. The black stone walls faired well against the elements, ashen ivy scaling the sides, filling in cracks in the foundation.

The former potion's master, shamed and beaten, started his way up the rain soaked path, slippery but paved and steep.

Severus never imagined hell as a warm place, never falling for the foolish childlike parody, but this was how he imagined hell, a rain soaked prison surrounded on all sides by crashing black waves. A dark beach encroaching onto dead land of crabgrass, long dead trees, and night serpents. Yet in this land, all-encompassing around death, a single winding road led to Satan himself, lined in the skulls of werewolves, serpents, horses, and ravens. Runespore skins and rat carcasses that the thestrals dared not approach.

It was the path that led straight into the maw of the devil, the demon that held his soul, cheaply sold years previous, and destroyed by the tendrils of smoke borne of lies and betrayal.

Because it was this path, the one that proved to be pain filled and tedious, that Snape found himself walking on weary limbs. Proving to be the only drug that would soften his wounds – and a drug it was, intoxicating faster than heroine and made to be much, much stronger.

The provocation of swift relief made him move even further, his journey uphill seemed cruelly metaphoric of what he endured through the days of war and his own private respite. The respite that had him flirting with death constantly. And perhaps that what had kept him going as the rainwater slid down his back and soaked through his robes and cloak.

He could feel the cold tremors sink into his bones, drops of acidic rain slipping down the harsh arches of his nose and burning thin, cracked lips. Greasy hair now frizzy and clumped, he tried to brush it out of the way, but the wind merely picked up as if in protest.

Severus finally made it to the lee of the castle, the wind cutting considerably as ornate, hopelessly gothic doors became visible in his line of vision, light spilling from the seams in the foundation.

A few snakes rustled in the grass, trying to flee from quickly escalating elements.

Snape reached out a boney hand, soaked and shaking, and held it to he door, running it over the familiar designs in some sort of bizarre reverie. He paused, letting the rainwater purge him of the anxiety and sheer hopelessness that had settled so strongly in his heart.

Long, refined digits reached the smooth surface of a snake, and he covered the serpent with a hand, closing his eyes and muttering a long string of practiced Latin, and with an answering hitch, the doors opened until a thin sliver of light cut through the dark island night.

The lounge room was large and ornate, silver chandelier a colossal centerpiece that held black candles on the noses of pewter basilisks with deep jeweled eyes. Black tile was set in the floor, where a staircase hugged round walls and ascended to another large wooden door that was already partially opened. Light spilling onto the balcony, voices could be heard, bickering it would seem, and Snape froze.

He had not expected any others, and because of much more pressing reasons than the chill in his bones, he was solidified in place.

"M-my Lord," a stammering voice intoned, inflections blubbery and unmistakably Wormtail, "Y-you do not mean that, master… please… I'm begging."

Severus did not hear the hiss of the Lord's curse, but flinched noticeably as the screams and wailing sobs of Pettigrew filled the empty entrance hall.

The screaming soon stopped, only to be replaced by a sputtering apology and incessant sobs from the rat like creature that called himself a man.

And then no noise at all. Not even the gentle snifflings of what was, as Snape assumed, a once alive tortured man. He was now merely a dead man, a soul lost in the war, and betrayed by his own master.

The former potion's master closed his eyes, trying to regain composure and stop the pounding of a migraine forming mercilessly behind his eyes. There was some shifting of robes and thump from upstairs, but it was once again silent. Snape's last ditch attempt to gain whatever equanimity he had left was crushed as he saw Nagini slowly make her way down the steps, gargantuan body liquidly traversing the entrance hall and sniffing the air with languid twitches of her tongue.

Her eyes were hooded – the basilisk was not aiming to kill, but Severus decided it was best to stay in place, not moving and barely breathing.

The snake yawned, showing off her yellowing saber like fangs as if in inadvertent warning.

And it was far too soon for Severus that the basilisk circled his feet, the feathery crest atop her head trembling slightly as she tossed her head in her primal nature.

Nagini nudged his leg, but Severus did not look down, for fear that their eyes would meet and he would die with that look of terror that young Myrtle had fifty years earlier – he was not there, but he had relived it through the eyes of Dumbledore during long, bizarre occlumency lessons.

The basilisk hissed something in parseltongue, although Severus did not know what she was saying, he knew it was an incessant warning of some sort – the inflections were not difficult to interpret.

The snake started going back up the stairs, surely to renew the loyalty to her master and warn Him that Snape had arrived.

And so Severus had little choice but to take the plunge that he had been long avoiding. The calm resolution that iced his veins was alarming, but as he ascended the stairs his stride was disturbingly succinct and well practiced.

Severus reached the landing, his breath cold and shallow. Great wooden doors were open merely a sliver, but a flickering inconsistent glow of candle light was cast through the crevice.

Taking a deep breath, the kind a man takes when being marched to the gallows; Snape raised his hand and rapped his knuckles on the door softly, before pushing open the door a bit wider.

A green leather armchair with shimmering silver trim was center of the room, pushed close to the fire and set upon an exotic rug depicting two serpents, one black and one white – one with black eyes, one with red, tangled and at a strange, uncanny asymmetrical equilibrium. Snape couldn't quite understand it.

Torch brackets were alight with dragon wax candles and a fire had burned down to the coals, its soft light gentle and golden. Portraits of various noble figures adorned the walls, gaudy silver frames surrounding oil depictions of Salazar Slytherin with beetle black eyes and dark defined brows; Vladzor Reffnison, the vampire lord, with deep curving fangs and blazing blue eyes; and Grindelwald with his angular face, wet green eyes, and lashing the air with a serpentine tongue.

"Come forward, Severus," the voice of the man occupying the armchair, so inhuman, shrill, and dangerous. But with keen ears of a teacher, Snape could pick up on the accents and inflections that were so familiar – and in a dark crevasse of his heart it eased him some.

It had become so easy, so simple, to discard his pride in the presence of this demon. It was something he no longer questioned when he had handed his moral compass to the devil so close to him. So close that Severus could hear the quicken of His breath, could almost feel the pulse mingle with his own.

So Snape did not hesitate to drop to his knees and drop his face as a sign of submission. The former potion's professor, that could send most students into a fit of tears, crawled forward as if admitting his shame and subtle inferiority.

Severus's eyes burned in his skull as he neared his Master's front, with a shaking hand reached toward his robe and lifted it to his mouth to kiss it.

"My lord," Snape said delicately, masking the shake in his voice, and retreating back on his knees and waiting for permission to do anything more.

While waiting, Severus was finally able to pick up on the smell of the Dark Lord, drowned by the cinnamon incense burning on the end table.

But that smell, so tied in Snape's memory, was brought to the forefront of his mind as he smelled the sweet tobacco and odd spices. Not quite as intoxicating and distinguished as years previous, but certainly there, that fact couldn't be denied.

Severus, although he didn't turn to look, felt the cold presence of Nagini circling him, before ascending the armchair that the Dark Lord sat upon, and settled herself around his shoulders.

"Severus," Voldemort finally said, his voice unreadable and placid, "stop this utter nonsense."

Snape understood, but didn't respond. The only visible change in his stature was that he lifted his head, and looked the Dark Lord squarely in the face, expression just as unreadable as the demon in front of him.

His Lord had gone through so many physical changes he was hardly recognizable, so serpentine and brazenly dangerous. His angular jaw was wrapped around teeth filed down to sharp points, eyes bulging, red, and wild. His hand resembled translucent white spiders with deep protruding blue and red ribbons.

He had his hood pulled over his face, but from what Snape could see, it looked as if he had grown a sheath of sparkling white hair that framed, and accentuated the sharp lines of his face.

"You are shivering, child," Voldemort finally said, breaking the silence, the expression in his voice so minimal it was alarming.

"It is cold, Master," Severus stated quietly, now becoming aware of the water dripping from his hair and onto his chest and back.

"You lie," the dark lord hissed, voice barely over a whisper, and the snake curled around his shoulder seemed to twitch and shiver. Perhaps Severus had imagined it.

"Why do you lie, Severus?" Voldemort now posing his statement as a question, but not seeking an answer, "I had accepted you, I had kept you… I feel betrayed, child."

Another pause.

"Severus," he said finally with a malicious inflection in his voice, "I do not appreciate treason."

Snape was so tired, and yet he lifted his head further and met the other man, no, he was no longer a man. He met His Lord's eyes, and tried to reach something in them, but failed as he hit the hard exterior.

"As do I, my Lord, as do I. Is it finished yet?"

The Dark Lord took great meaning in this, and merely steepled his spider like fingers in front of him, looking down at the man kneeling before him in an almost fatherly way. Almost.

"Hardly, child," Voldemort allowed, his voice now softer, but no less harsh and alien, "I grow wary of these games."

"It ceased to be a game long ago, Master," Snape said, equally as quiet, "the sun has set on any reason that humanity once had. Without Dumbledore, they are a decapitated chicken."

"Such crude terms," the Dark Lord replied, a crooked smile stretching his face grotesquely, "but I see your logic. You are always the level headed one, Severus, always have been."

"With all due respect, My Lord, I think on that point you are mistaken," Severus said, taking a shuddering breath as the warmth of the fire thawed his bones and the ache of his muscles returned.

Voldemort's muscles moved around his eyes, and with mild shock, Severus realized that his Master did not have eyelids and that was the closest human blink he could achieve.

Nagini hissed something in her Master's ear, and the Dark Lord returned her statement with a slight nod. The snake bodily returned to the floor and was gone in a blink, slipping down the stairs and out of the way. Voldemort returned his attention to Snape, still kneeling on the floor, a dull look in glazed eyes.

"The sun has set. The world is dark Severus. Dark like you… dark like us," Voldemort said, his voice low and seductive, "you fight it, my child, you fight the power, and the ability to take back your soul, to wrong those that have wronged you. The world has left you crippled, shivering, and cold. You could always leave that behind."

Severus didn't respond right away, but bowed his head, and thought. He was kneeling in an addict's purgatory, and yet, he had made commitments that he would have to complete.

The candlelight was flickering over His Lord's face as he looked up, looking more inhuman than ever. The red eyes were pooled with monstrous hunger, and it was that hunger that made a dry knot rise in his throat.

"I cannot," Severus said, his voice hoarse, "My Lord, I am betrayed, and I have made promises that I intend to keep."

Voldemort didn't lose his composure, and his stance did not falter, but as always, he just leaned back and nodded, as if this exchange was expected. Severus studied the rug he was kneeling on, the eyes of the serpents were boring holes in him, so he closed his eyes.

"Child, your room is upstairs. Wash and sleep, I will be awake and will have someone deliver you a drink," His Lord said, emotion no longer present, "be careful not to trip on Wormtail. He met his demise somewhere near the stairs."

Voldemort waved his hand vaguely in the direction of the stairwell.

"I trust I will see you again?"

Severus stood on shaking limbs and voiced tiredly, "If things go as planned."

Voldemort nodded, and Severus was dismissed.


End file.
